


Run

by feeding_geese



Series: Thelly [1]
Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-28
Updated: 2012-12-28
Packaged: 2017-11-22 18:41:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/612990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feeding_geese/pseuds/feeding_geese
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The remnants of District 12 flee into the woods.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Run

Four. 

  
Four pairs of legs running through fire. 

  
Then three. 

  
Then two and all I can think of is making sure Loam makes it away from town. Away from town will be safe. 

  
There are others running, faces I know but can’t recognize right now. Follow them. Get Loam out. 

  
They’ve pulled the fence down and I see the population of the Seam flood into the woods. Ashen, panicked faces in a blur until one pulls into focus. He passes a small, crying girl into a young woman’s arms and begins to push his way through the mob. Eventually his hands are on my face, my arms. His eyes are wild and his lips are moving, but my ears are ringing and I can’t hear a word he’s yelling. I can tell what he’s asking, though. Is anyone else coming? I think of the sound the bakery made. Cort and Voss and I pray it was quick and—

  
I shake my head. 

  
I feel a rumble deep in my bones and a wave of heat as the mines erupt in flame. We stare for a second before Thom hefts my little brother over his shoulder and grabs my hand tight, refusing to let me slip away. He hauls us into the woods.   
We’re well into the trees when my hearing starts to return. Aside from the odd cry of an infant or moan from the injured, we are all silent. The shuffling of our feet over the forest floor echoing our collective confusion. 

  
“Thom,” my voice crackles with smoke. “You—your family…”

  
“All accounted for,” he breathes. “Gus is keeping an eye on them.” He shouldn’t be back here with us, with his family so far ahead.

  
“But you should-“

  
“It’s okay, Delly,” he whispers. And we leave it at that. 

  
The remains of District 12 push through the dense foliage, which must be lovely under different circumstances. I could see why Katniss would love to come here. I let my mind wander on her fate for a second, on that of my best friend left howling in the jungle for her, before I force myself to snap back in the moment. You have to take care of Loam. See where we are in a few days, but for now you cannot crack, Delly. Not for Mama and Pa. Not for Cort and Voss. Not for Peeta. Be right here, right now. For Loam.   
Thom set him down once we were a ways in. He’s trying to hold himself together, trying not to show where he turned his ankle on a root a mile back. But a gasp gives him away and Thom lifts my brother up onto his back without a sound.   
Another hour passes before I speak again. 

  
“Do you know where he’s taking us?” No one needed to tell me that Gale Hawthorne is in charge. It’s the logical choice, since he knows the woods so well, but to keep this many people moving, even if we are just shambling bodies, takes a certain quality of leadership. 

  
Madge would be proud. 

  
I wonder if she’s here. 

  
“He said there’s a lake up a ways. It’s fresh water and easy game. Should be there soon enough.”

  
Not another word passes between us until we reach the lake.   
  
I’ve never seen so much water in my days. I stare at it, trying to fathom how deep it is, to keep my eyes off the smoke massing above the trees in an ominous cloud. Thom stakes us out a spot on the shore and puts Loam down, silently stretching out his back. I prop my brother’s foot up on a boulder and smooth his ashy curls back. 

  
“I’m going to see how Gale wants to run this, then I’ll be back.”

  
“Thom, you have to find your family.” As if on cue, a tall girl of thirteen with his straight features scurries up, a child in her arms.

   
“Thompson, where have you been?” She’s so calm. But this family has known tragedy before. When the little girl whines, he takes her in his arms.

   
“Go tell Mama I’m fine.” He turns to the one he’s holding. “Hey there, sugar snap, stop your belly-aching.” Back to the older girl. “I’m gonna help Gale sort things, then I’m gonna stay with Delly and her brother.”

  
“ _That’s_ Delly?” she whispers, and in the madness, two thoughts strike me. One: Whether due to my status or my appearance, I am not the kind of girl Thom’s sister pictures him associating with. Two: For some reason, Thom’s sister knows I exist. 

  
“You’re in charge of the kids, Laurel,” he says a little harshly, as though she’s spoken out of turn. “Help Mama out. I’ll be by as soon as I know what’s going on.” She takes the child back and nods before flitting off through the milling crowd. 

“How does she know my name?” He kneels down, and I think if it weren’t for the situation, he’d laugh at me.

   
“You say smart things. Sometimes I share them with Laurel. You two sit tight and I’ll be back.”

  
“You don’t have to—”

  
“I want to. Please, Delly. Let me.” I nod and he squeezes my shoulder before he’s gone.

   
Loam’s finally cracking, and I let him. I hold him and rock him until his moans become sobs and his sobs become snores. I feel a little better knowing that he can have his. Mine will have to wait.   
We’re deep into the night when he settles in behind me and wraps an arm around the two of us. I was worried he’d want to move us close to his family, but he seems willing to let us have our space. 

  
“We managed to set up a watch for predators or hovercrafts. Gale says he doesn’t think the Capitol will bother with us, since they let us get this far out, but might as well keep an eye out for one while looking for the other. Set a few snares but he’s gonna take a group of us hunting tomorrow—no idea how many we hafta feed. Water won’t be an issue at least—there’s a stream that seems to run pretty clean. Had to break up a few fistfights over sleeping spots. Woulda thought people’d be past fighting.”

  
“It’s the stress,” I whisper.

   
“‘Spose you’re right.” He brushes my smoke-scented hair to one side and kisses the back of my neck. It’s a sad, sad kiss.   
  
 **DAY ONE**

  
I wake up later than I would’ve liked. Loam’s already up, gnawing on a cooked wing of something.

   
“Thom’s already come and gone,” he says in a voice only slightly quieter than I’m used to. “Left us this.” He pushes another wing and a small handful of berries across the wet grass. “I’ve already had mine.”  
I haven’t the mind for food, but my body says otherwise and I’ve stripped the bone before I know it. Liam goes to toss them away when an elderly Seam woman stays his hand.

   
“Hold onto the bones, child. You can gnaw on them when the hunger strikes. And we can boil them later for a broth.”  
I’m suddenly ashamed at how much we wasted in our lives. I offer her my berries in thanks, but she refuses.   
“I’m used to a little grumble at my age.” I tell her we’ll throw all our bones together tonight and share the spoils and she smiles as much as she’s able.

   
Loam’s ankle isn’t looking bad, but it’s still swollen. I tear a strip from the hem of my slip, which has remained startlingly clean, and bind it tightly. Then I pull a sizable limb from a tree with the help of some very tall miners and fashion him a crude crutch. With my brother on his feet, we set out to be useful.

   
Word passes that the Everdeens have set up healing in a little concrete shack. The line of people looking for treatment seems miles long. It seems there is one fair head for every hundred dark ones, and my hope that any of my friends made it out of town dwindles. It settles into a dark pit in my stomach I’ve reserved for mourning. 

  
“Typical Merch kid, trying to cut the line,” snaps a Seam boy, not two years older than me. “Still think you can march in and get first pick?” He’s tired and stressed and injured and probably mourning. And that turns to anger. So I meet his eyes with the gentlest face I can muster, as a smile would be condescending.

   
“I can stitch,” I explain. “I thought an extra pair of hands could get people treated faster. He doesn’t need treating,” I take Loam’s free hand in mine. “I just would rather not leave him right now.”  
The boy’s cheeks light up with shame and he nods silently. There’s no need for his embarrassment. Everyone knows that we lived better, and other merchants certainly took advantage of their status. He doesn’t know that we struggled, too. 

  
I explain that we have no designs on cutting the line a half dozen more times before reaching the shack. Primrose Everdeen’s face lights up with relief upon seeing Loam, and she leaves her post seeing to a Seam boy’s busted lip to hug my brother tightly. They are—were—in the same class, and though they ran in different circles, they seem friendly with each other. The boy on the floor scowls at Loam, and I reiterate that we’re not there to cut the line.   
Mrs. Everdeen seems grateful for the assistance and wears the same face I do. Far, far away there is someone that we love. And if we don’t keep busy, we’ll spend the day fretting over where they are, what’s being done to them. So we work.   
Mrs. Everdeen was quick enough to grab a small medical box with a needle and thread inside from her home and she makes short work of the Seam boy’s lip while I tear the rest of my slip into bandages. He gives Primrose a possessive hug before leaving, but I stop him at the door. 

  
“Do you know Thompson Whitt?” He nods. 

  
“He’s my brother’s crew mate.”

  
“If you happen upon him, could you tell him the Cartwrights are with the Everdeens?” I think of him popping by our campsite with news and worrying when he can’t find us. Thom likes all his ducks in a row. 

  
Mrs. Everdeen sends her daughter and Loam out into the brush for herbs and wood to stoke the fire that keeps our sterilizing water at a constant boil. I’m not one for blood, but the tasks she gives me keep me grounded and we establish a steady pace, whisking patients in and out again. At one point, Thom appears with more food and he looks truly awful. Ragged and in dire need of sleep. I consider telling him so, but he’s by long enough to see we get our rations and give me half a smile before he’s off onto his next task. 

“He needs to sleep,” Mrs. Everdeen says matter-of-factly, rubbing some herb salve into our blacksmith’s burned leg. 

“He won’t let himself,” I sigh in reply. “He’ll go until he collapses.”

“You’ve known him long?” It’s a strange attempt at easy conversation. She married Seam, though, so maybe she sees a bit of her late husband in Thom. 

“Years. We’re friends.” We don’t speak on it again.   
  
Primrose Everdeen is like a tiny beacon of hope, and I find that, like most of Panem, I like her instantly. She points out the different herbs and their healing properties, giving me a lesson in basic healing, and holds my hand when I turn green as she drains an abscess. 

  
“Remember when Katniss had to drain Peeta’s leg in the arena?” she smiles. “I almost laughed at the faces she was making.”

  
“How?” is all I manage to eke out. I can’t remember a moment of the Games when I wasn’t nauseous with anxiety. 

  
“When she found him, I just knew they’d be alright. They’d take care of each other. Like now,” she squeezes my hand tightly. “They’re together. Taking care of each other.”  
  
 **DAY TWO**

  
I don’t like leaving Loam, but Thom needs to sleep and I know how to make him. I send my brother to gather wood with Prim and snatch Thom when he stops for his hourly check-in. I drag him to an unoccupied part of the forest where our hands twitch furiously against each other and our bodies shake from fatigue and stress and relief until we collapse under a tree, panting. He says he can only stay a minute, but his head rolls onto my breast and he sleeps for five full hours. 

  
He curses himself when he wakes up, but he looks a little better, and he gives himself a bit before running off again. Sitting with his fingers twined in mine, I can feel myself slipping. He catches the first tears and reverses our positions, pulling me up into his lap and wrapping those long arms all around me. He doesn’t tell me it’s okay. We both know okay is a lifetime away now.

   
“I don’t think I can do it,” My breath shudders against his neck. “I’m responsible for Loam now and I…I’m not a parent, Thom, I—” He pulls me back by the shoulders and takes my face in his hands. His eyes are hard and determined.

   
“You can.”

  
“Thom, you don’t—”

  
“The hell I don’t. I know. I know what you lost. I know how it feels. But I know you’re smart and resourceful. You love each other. And you’ll piece it together.”

  
When I get back to the shack, I hold Loam so close I hear the joints in his back crack into alignment.   
  
 **DAY THREE**

  
Business in the shack has slowed, so I’m helping Iris, our campsite neighbor, boil bones into stock. It’ll stretch our food and give us an extra boost if we start traveling again, which is what Gale wants. I have no idea what we’d be moving toward, but even if we moved deeper into the woods we could start making more permanent structures.

   
Loam is just hobbling back, his arms full of kindling, when the hovercrafts come.

   
Immediately I grab Loam in one hand and Iris in the other and haul them into the woods. There is mass hysteria around the lake as our refugee camp scatters in all directions. We wait for the bombs but they don’t come. Instead a voice booms from a loudspeaker, informing us that District 13 has arrived to rescue us. It has to be a trick—there is no District 13, not anymore—yet I can see Gale Hawthorne and his crew, Thom included, approach the site where the first craft has landed. I hold my breath, waiting for the door to open and bullets to rain out. 


End file.
